FALLS CITY – The Oct. 16 regular meeting saw the Falls City ISD school board approve a resolution that would allow the district give a financial contribution to the Texas Taxpayer and Student Fairness Coalition.

The contribution approved was at $0.50 per WADA (weighted average daily attendance), which totals $272 for the year.

The Texas Taxpayer and Student Fairness Coalition is an advocate organization that represents nearly 400 school districts in financial issues, among them a school finance litigation battle with the State of Texas regarding fair and proper funding of Texas public schools.

The Coalition had previously filed a lawsuit against the State of Texas on the basis that the “public school finance system was broken and failed to fund public schools in an efficient, equitable and adequate manner, as required by the Texas Constitution.”

“Right now the current lawsuit that is against the State of Texas is saying that the current funding system is unconstitutional because it doesn’t adequately disperse the wealth,” explained Superintendent Tylor Chaplin after the meeting. “Like in our case now, we have so much recapture for Chapter 41 districts, which are ‘property wealthy’ districts; a lot of our money goes back to the state. For Chapter 42 districts (districts designated as ‘property poor’), they receive money from the state.”

Chaplin states that both Chapter 41 and Chapter 42 districts are a part of the lawsuit against the State of Texas that says that the way schools are funded is inadequate, and that there should be a better way to do it.